Surgical and Interventional Sciences (Non-Thesis) (M.Sc.) (45 credits)
Offered by: Surgery (Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences)
Degree: Master of Science
Program credit weight: 45
Program Description
This M.Sc. in Surgical and Interventional Sciences; Non‐Thesis offers training in core fundamentals of modern surgical research. The program is flexible and provides the core disciplines in more specific areas such as global surgery, innovation, education, or other disciplines. The individual research interests of the faculty cover a wide spectrum, from injury, repair, recovery, tissue engineering, transplantation, fibrosis, cancer and stem cell biology, biomechanics, and organ failure, to surgical simulation, surgical innovation, education, and evaluative/outcomes research. Importantly, the project(s) is performed in a collaborative spirit with basic and clinician scientists working together using interdisciplinary approaches to solve the most challenging problems in the field of surgery.
Note: For information about Fall 2025 and Winter 2026 course offerings, please check back on May 8, 2025. Until then, the "Terms offered" field will appear blank for most courses while the class schedule is being finalized.
Required Courses (12 credits)
| Course | Title | Credits |
|---|---|---|
| EXSU 500 | Artificial Intelligence in Medicine . | 3 |
Artificial Intelligence in Medicine . Terms offered: Fall 2025 Introduction to artificial intelligence (AI) applied to issues in medical diagnosis, therapy selection and learning from health data. Various AI methods, electronic medical records, and ethical/security concerns. Machine learning approaches including deep learning and reinforcement learning without delving too deeply into the technical details. | ||
| EXSU 602 | Knowledge Management 2. | 3 |
Knowledge Management 2. Terms offered: Winter 2026 Critical elements required for the creation and delivery of digital slide presentations. | ||
| EXSU 623 | Surgery Research Project 2. | 6 |
Surgery Research Project 2. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Immersion into a specific research area and completion of a short project. Students will learn to develop a project and to demonstrate skills essential for analysis, evaluation and project management. | ||
Complementary Courses (24 credits)
3 credits selected from:
| Course | Title | Credits |
|---|---|---|
| EDPE 575 | Statistics for Practitioners. | 3 |
Statistics for Practitioners. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Understanding and interpreting basic statistical procedures used in basic and applied research, including graphs, measures of central tendency and variability, hypothesis testing, and correlations, t-tests, and basic ANOVA designs. | ||
| EPIB 507 | Biostats for Health Sciences. | 3 |
Biostats for Health Sciences. Terms offered: Summer 2025 Basic principles of statistical inference applicable to clinical, epidemiologic, and other health research. Topics include: methods of describing data, statistical inference for means, statistical inference for proportions, non-parametric statistics, correlation and introduction to linear regression. | ||
| EXSU 606 | Statistics for Surgical Research. | 3 |
Statistics for Surgical Research. Terms offered: Fall 2025 Review of statistics for surgical research. | ||
Or 3 credits of a research design or statistics course at the 500 level or higher.
3 credits selected from:
| Course | Title | Credits |
|---|---|---|
| EXSU 603 | Surgical Education Foundations. | 3 |
Surgical Education Foundations. Terms offered: Fall 2025, Winter 2026 Critical overview of key educational and educational psychology theories and assessment principles to guide surgical education. Different surgical education environments analyzed and evaluated using theory, empirical evidence, and assessment practices. | ||
| FMED 525 | Foundations of Translational Science. | 3 |
Foundations of Translational Science. Terms offered: Winter 2026 An overview of multidisciplinary research that bridges significant gaps between basic, clinical medicine and public policy that enables a translation of knowledge to practice. | ||
6 credits selected from the following1:
| Course | Title | Credits |
|---|---|---|
| EDPE 637 | Issues in Health Professions Education. | 3 |
Issues in Health Professions Education. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. An overview of health professions education issues, including: learning and assessment in the clinical setting, medical core competencies, design, delivery and evaluation of health professions education programs, organization management of health professions education programs and systems, organizational change and leadership, clinical reasoning and decision making, interdisciplinary education. | ||
| EDPH 689 | Teaching and Learning in Higher Education. | 3 |
Teaching and Learning in Higher Education. Terms offered: Summer 2025 Students will develop an understanding of teaching and learning as a process in which instruction is based on the learning to be accomplished. Students will design, develop, and evaluate a university course of their choice, and will develop facility and confidence in using teaching methods appropriate to their domains. | ||
| EPIB 521 | Regression Analysis for Health Sciences. | 3 |
Regression Analysis for Health Sciences. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. The aim of this course is to provide students with basic principles of regression analyses applicable to the health sciences so that they can understand and use appropriate statistical regression techniques for continuous and discrete data. The course will cover: Linear regression: Regression for two or more explanatory variables, Polynomial regression, Dummy variables, Inference for regression parameters, Confounding and collinearity, Effect modification, Model-checking, Model selection, Prediction. Logistic and Poisson regression: Logistic regression for one or more variables, Interpreting odds ratios, Inference for logistic and Poisson regression parameters, Confounding and interactions in logistic regression, Model selection, Prediction. A very brief overview of survival analysis. | ||
| EXSU 505 | Trends in Precision Oncology. | 3 |
Trends in Precision Oncology. Terms offered: Fall 2025 Introduction to the emerging paradigms in cancer detection, management and treatment. | ||
| EXSU 620 | Surgical Innovation 1. | 3 |
Surgical Innovation 1. Terms offered: Fall 2025 The process of surgical innovation and acquisition of hands-on skills necessary to work within a multi-disciplinary team in the creation of a novel, need driven, and marketable prototype used in the care of the surgical patient. This is the first of a 3 part course introducing concepts and performing needs analyses. | ||
| EXSU 621 | Surgical Innovation 2. | 3 |
Surgical Innovation 2. Terms offered: Winter 2026 This course builds on key concepts and needs screening delivered and generated in EXSU 620 to develop hands-on skills necessary to work within a multi-disciplinary team in the creation of a novel, need driven, and marketable prototype used in the care of the surgical patient. | ||
| PPHS 528 | Economic Evaluation of Health Programs. | 3 |
Economic Evaluation of Health Programs. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Concepts and methods used to carry out economic evaluations of health programs and interventions, including public health interventions, pharmaceuticals, and other health care interventions. Includes topics such as calculation of unit costs, measurement of quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) and assessment of uncertainty in cost-effectiveness analysis. | ||
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Note: Students either take EDPE 637 Issues in Health Professions Education. and EDPH 689 Teaching and Learning in Higher Education.; or EPIB 521 Regression Analysis for Health Sciences. and PPHS 528 Economic Evaluation of Health Programs.; or EXSU 620 Surgical Innovation 1. and EXSU 621 Surgical Innovation 2.; or EXSU 505 Trends in Precision Oncology. and any course in the course grouping available in a given year if the number of registered students has not exceeded the projected enrolment.
12 credits selected from:
| Course | Title | Credits |
|---|---|---|
| BMDE 653 | Patents in Biomedical Engineering. | 3 |
Patents in Biomedical Engineering. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. This is a practical course on patents with emphasis on biomedical engineering applications. The course offers an overview of intellectual property, patents, and the patenting process. The course also provides insights into the strategies relating to commercialization and exploiting of patents, as well as enforcing patents. This course is designed to help biomedical engineers who will encounter patents in their work and needs to understand the nature and the scope of the patent system, how patents are obtained, and how to commercially exploit a patent. | ||
| BMDE 654 | Biomedical Regulatory Affairs - Medical Devices. | 3 |
Biomedical Regulatory Affairs - Medical Devices. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Regulatory strategies and quality management systems are critical for medical device development. This course provides an overview of regulatory requirements, and familiarize students with the important ISO and IEC standards pertaining to medical device development. This course will provide biomedical engineers with an understanding of the regulatory and quality requirements to translate a medical device idea into a commercial product, and will draw upon the expertise of invited speakers currently working in the medical devices industry. | ||
| BMDE 655 | Biomedical Clinical Trials - Medical Devices. | 3 |
Biomedical Clinical Trials - Medical Devices. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. This course will train biomedical engineers to understand the clinical and business aspects of transferring a medical device idea into a commercial product. This course provides an overview of the pre‐clinical and clinical testing of medical devices, clinical trials, reimbursement systems, market analysis, sales models, and business models, as pertaining to medical devices. This course will also cover the design of randomized trials, including statistical principles, hypothesis postulating, bias minimization, and randomization methods. | ||
| DENT 669 | Extracellular Matrix Biology. | 3 |
Extracellular Matrix Biology. Terms offered: Fall 2025 Advanced topics on extracellular matrix biology with emphasis on matrix molecules and their effects on cell communication, tissue structure and integrity. | ||
| EDPE 637 | Issues in Health Professions Education. | 3 |
Issues in Health Professions Education. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. An overview of health professions education issues, including: learning and assessment in the clinical setting, medical core competencies, design, delivery and evaluation of health professions education programs, organization management of health professions education programs and systems, organizational change and leadership, clinical reasoning and decision making, interdisciplinary education. | ||
| EDPE 687 | Qualitative Methods in Educational Psychology. | 3 |
Qualitative Methods in Educational Psychology. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. The logics of design and selection of phenomenology, grounded theory, ethnography, case study and mixed design methods with emphasis on data analysis in light of issues of research purpose, epistemology, reliability and validity. | ||
| EDPH 689 | Teaching and Learning in Higher Education. | 3 |
Teaching and Learning in Higher Education. Terms offered: Summer 2025 Students will develop an understanding of teaching and learning as a process in which instruction is based on the learning to be accomplished. Students will design, develop, and evaluate a university course of their choice, and will develop facility and confidence in using teaching methods appropriate to their domains. | ||
| EPIB 681 | Global Health: Epidemiological Research. | 3 |
Global Health: Epidemiological Research. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. A review of selected epidemiological research focussing on global health and disease topics. Research will be mostly from developing countries and research methods will be highlighted. Case studies will be used to illustrate specific applications and challenges. | ||
| EXMD 609 | Cellular Methods in Medical Research. | 3 |
Cellular Methods in Medical Research. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Different cellular methods used in biomedical research, including spectroscopic, microscopic and immunological techniques as well as statistics. Lectures, some demonstrations by faculty as well as short seminars given by the students. | ||
| EXMD 610 | Molecular Methods in Medical Research. | 3 |
Molecular Methods in Medical Research. Terms offered: Winter 2026 Different molecular methods used in biomedical research, including chromatography, purification and analysis of proteins and nucleic acids, various techniques in molecular biology, transgenic technology, and stem cells. Lectures, some demonstrations, and short seminars given by the students. | ||
| EXSU 501 | Medical Technology Internship 1. | 6 |
Medical Technology Internship 1. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. This is a 6-weeks/37.5 hour per week internship course where students undertake a significant experiential learning opportunity through direct observation, reflection and evaluation with a variety of medical, medical education, medical research and healthcare sectors. The course starts with an orientation session and concludes with a debrief session and generation of a professional skills development plan. This course complements and is followed by a second 6-week internship - EXSU 502 which allows students to change hosts and receive targeted training in communication and management. | ||
| EXSU 601 | Knowledge Management 1. | 3 |
Knowledge Management 1. Terms offered: Fall 2025 Critical elements required for the preparation and evaluation of abstracts and full-length manuscripts. | ||
| EXSU 605 | Biomedical Research Innovation. | 3 |
Biomedical Research Innovation. Terms offered: Fall 2025, Winter 2026 Introduction to the novel and/or emerging technologies in the field of biomedical research. | ||
| EXSU 620 | Surgical Innovation 1. | 3 |
Surgical Innovation 1. Terms offered: Fall 2025 The process of surgical innovation and acquisition of hands-on skills necessary to work within a multi-disciplinary team in the creation of a novel, need driven, and marketable prototype used in the care of the surgical patient. This is the first of a 3 part course introducing concepts and performing needs analyses. | ||
| EXSU 621 | Surgical Innovation 2. | 3 |
Surgical Innovation 2. Terms offered: Winter 2026 This course builds on key concepts and needs screening delivered and generated in EXSU 620 to develop hands-on skills necessary to work within a multi-disciplinary team in the creation of a novel, need driven, and marketable prototype used in the care of the surgical patient. | ||
| EXSU 622D1 | Surgery Research Project 1. | 6 |
Surgery Research Project 1. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Immersion into a specific research area and completion of a project. Students will learn to develop a project and to demonstrate skills essential for analysis, evaluation and project management. | ||
| EXSU 622D2 | Surgery Research Project 1. | 6 |
Surgery Research Project 1. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Immersion into a specific research area and completion of a project. Students will learn to develop a project and to demonstrate skills essential for analysis, evaluation and project management. | ||
| EXSU 684 | Signal Transduction. | 3 |
Signal Transduction. Terms offered: Fall 2025 A study of signal transduction. | ||
| FMED 619 | Program Management in Global Health and Primary Health Care. | 3 |
Program Management in Global Health and Primary Health Care. Terms offered: Winter 2026 Program management design, theory, methods and practical applications in both domestic and global health settings, with a focus on primary health care in order to achieve rapid scale-up of effective health interventions towards universal coverage while strengthening health systems for sustained impact. | ||
| PHGY 518 | Artificial Cells. | 3 |
Artificial Cells. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Physiology, biotechnology, chemistry and biomedical application of artificial cells, blood substitutes, immobilized enzymes, microorganisms and cells, hemoperfusion, artificial kidneys, and drug delivery systems. PHGY 517 and PHGY 518 when taken together, will give a complete picture of this field. However, the student can select one of these. | ||
| PHGY 550 | Molecular Physiology of Bone. | 3 |
Molecular Physiology of Bone. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Students will develop a working knowledge of cartilage and bone. Discussion topics will include: molecular and cellular environment of bone; heritable and acquired skeletal defects; research models used to study metabolic bone disease. | ||
| PPHS 511 | Fundamentals of Global Health. | 3 |
Fundamentals of Global Health. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. This exciting and interactive course aims to give students the opportunity to broaden their understanding and knowledge of global health issues, including global burden of diseases, determinants of health, transition in health and drivers of such transition, challenges in healthcare delivery in resource-limited settings, and the variety of agencies and actors engaged in addressing global health challenges. The course consists of lectures, case studies, debates, discussions and small group work. | ||
| PPHS 529 | Global Environmental Health and Burden of Disease. | 3 |
Global Environmental Health and Burden of Disease. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. This course presents the grand challenges in global health from environmental and occupational risks along with the multi-disciplinary methods used to identify, control, and prevent them. It will introduce students to knowledge and skills in core disciplines of environmental health and approaches to environmental risk recognition, control and prevention in a global context. | ||
Elective Courses (9 credits)
9 credits taken from 500-, 600-, or 700-level courses at the University, which may include courses from the list above, will be taken with the approval of the director of the program/adviser.